Clear and present danger – The South Pacific island of Tuvalu should be a model of sustainability. But plastic pollution is having a devastating effect on the formerly pristine environment, and it may be responsible for the declining health of many islanders.

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Photos:The plastic age

A plastic ocean – British producer Jo Ruxton and her team have spent four years documenting the effects of plastic pollution for the upcoming documentary "A Plastic Ocean." She hopes the film will challenge people and societies to stop thinking of the material as disposable.

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Photos:The plastic age

No safe haven – The crew visited dozens of sites from the Arctic to the Mediterranean and Hawaii, without ever finding a plastic-free location. The average square kilometer of ocean contains around 20,000 microplastic pieces.

End of the line – Endangered species such as sea turtles could be driven to extinction by the plastic plague.

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Photos:The plastic age

Drowning in plastic – Plastic pollution has rapidly accelerated, with eight million tons entering the marine environment each year, according to scientists. This figure is set to rise as production of the material is set to double over the next 20 years.

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Photos:The plastic age

Burning problem – In many of the worst affected countries such as China and the Philippines, local people lack the infrastructure to properly dispose of plastic waste. In some cases they burn it, releasing dangerous gases associated with cancer.

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Photos:The plastic age

Plastic people – There are also concerns that people are consuming dangerous plastic through contaminated fish. A recent survey, published in Scientific Reports journal, revealed that a quarter of market fish in Indonesia and California contain plastic.

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Photos:The plastic age

Picking up the pieces – There are different ideas about how to address the crisis. The U.S. National and Atmospheric Association favors beach cleaning and public education at local level, combined with challenging policymakers and plastic producers to promote conservation.

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Photos:The plastic age

Recycling efforts are becoming more creative. Plastic waste is now converted into building materials in Cameroon and the Philippines. Charging for plastic bags and bottles and bags has helped to reduce waste.

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Photos:The plastic age

Far out – Dutch entrepreneur Boyan Slat has a more ambitious vision. The 21-year-old has designed a huge trash-eating machine that he intends to deploy at the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. He believes it can remove 99% of the debris within 30 years.

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"It's because we're using so much of the planet and we're destroying so much of (these animals') habitat."

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In the report, the rapid extinction is blamed on habitat loss, over exploitation of resources, pollution and climate change.

Wetlands, lakes and rivers were the worst hit since 1970, seeing an 81% decrease intheir species population -- about 4% a year.

'A threat to our future'

Among the species mentioned in the report are elephants, whose numbers have fallen by a fifth in ten years, as well as sharks and rays, a third of whom face extinction from overfishing.

Taylor said the deaths of animals and fish across the globe weren't just a threat to biodiversity but could see humanity threatened as well.

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"Governments (need) to take action to halt the slow death of the planet because it isn't just affecting wild species it's affecting us too. This is a threat to our future as a species, what we're doing to the planet," he said.

"We only have one planet if we screw it up then we're gone."

To prevent a sixth mass extinction, Taylor said governments must take immediate action to cut down on emissions and habitat destruction.

"There's a lot people can do even if they're not wealthy or living in wealthy countries, such as using renewable energy, looking for certified sustainable products and most particularly talking to your members of parliament ... saying you want strong environmental laws," he said.

The report was compiled by monitoring trends in 14,152 populations of 3,706 different species of vertebrates, including fish, mammals and birds, across the world.

Report findings criticized

Despite agreeing with its overall findings, some conservationists have criticized the report's results, saying it could be "misleading."

"That's a fairly silly kind of number to report,"said Stuart Pimm, the Doris Duke Chair of Conservation Ecology at Duke University, referring to the overall 58% decline in wildlife populations.

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"It mixes what's going on in the ocean with what's going on in the land. It mixes studies of bird populations in Europe with mammal populations in Africa. It has very few data points in South America."

But Taylor said the WWF had been "transparent" about the variability in their data.

"There's always going to be criticisms, we know that there's a lot of variability in the data and that's all expressed quite openly in the report itself ... we know that this not an easy task to try and aggregate numbers across an entire planet," he said.

Anthony Barnosky, Stanford University's Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve executive director, said it was important to note the report said two thirds of individual animals would disappear, not two thirds of species.

"I don't think I would quibble with the trend they're pointing out. We're losing individuals of species and geographic ranges at a really rapid rate," he said.